Charter School Teacher Villages being constructed in New Jersey

[Starry Messenger]

http://dailycensored.com/2010/07/31/charter-school-teacher-villages-being-constructed-in-new-jersey/

Teacher Villages for charter schools: Medieval castles for the educational company store

Meet Ron Beit, a New York developer, fresh from gaining approval from the New Jersey City’s Landmarks & Preservation Commission for a huge corporate development set to house teachers. Beit is is pressing ahead with a “Teachers Village”, anchored by charter schools and apartments marketed to educators in New Jersey. The idea is reminiscent of a medieval castle where teachers do not venture out of the castle walls much but get to sleep in the ‘stable’ when not working as serfs for the new charter investors.

<snip>

The city planning board had no problem or hesitation in voting to approve construction of a four-block-long mixed-use development back in April of 2010. The decision was barely noticed outside a small circle of civic boosters and of course, deep pocketed investors. But it was a turning point in the career of the project’s architect, Richard Meier (The By the Architects, for the People: A Trend for the 2010s, NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF. New York Times, May 3, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/04/arts/design/04meier.html?_r=1).

In all, “Teachers Village” would include three charter schools with some 1,000 students and 221 units of so-called workforce housing (ibid). Company stores for the busloads of Teach for America kids that will be expected to come in, non-unionized of course, and work and breathe within the company’s enterprise. Private management of the ‘villages’ will be the cornerstone of rentals and thus privatized housing will undergo a marriage with privatized charter schools.

<snip>

The issue of gentrification and urban removal cannot be separated from the new turnaround artists and their plans for increasing charter schools. They work with developers on plans to not only centralize the exploitation of both labor and students, but they are also conscious of the need Wall Street has for plans to make a mountain of money off the construction of capital projects in the form of what can only be seen as a post-modern insidious company store.

From the comments section weilunion writes:

...with the new teachers our ‘rulers’ will make sure there is no historical memory of anything called a ‘union’. They will use the teachers as ‘call centers’, 24/7 in their ruthless exploitation of teachers. Historical amnesia is being ushered in by Weingarten and her alliance with the forces of evil. Short term thinking cutting the throat long term.

sBut what a boon for the Wall Street traders, and Build for America Bonds, the Goldman Sachs Reinvestment Act add on. Now the city can be turned over to the turnaround artists while we turn in our grave.

The interesting thing is that with virtual charter schools becoming the next wave and vouchers to support them so the kiddies can get an ‘education’ at home or in cubicles, the real estate will be turned again; this time to no doubt anybody having a ‘dime’ which is not many.

The whole thing is unsustainable, it is fraud and larceny on a grand level.

Too bad we have no working class movement in this country that can see this. This is the problem, we carve out problems with failing insitutions from the overall failure of a system called capitalism and we then become reformers.

Kids will not put up with it, TFT, as I did not in my opprssive high school. More drop outs, more security, less learning and thus one will see the whole homeschool thing break the water bag.

People do not care about kids, by and large in this society; for if they did, they would promote policies that would restore a future. Looks to me like the future is the present but with new challenges.

Agreed.

[DrDan]

1. too much profit at stake . . .

[LostinVA]

2. omg n/t

[LooseWilly]

3. Brilliant plan to bilk the public for housing and school

... con the public into paying for their charter schools and pocket the money they don't pay the teachers, then get the public to subsidize housing for the noble & under-paid teachers— profiting the developers who are under-paying the teachers in the first place... double-dipping into the public pocket and probably charging the teachers everything they can afford (which, since they're the ones doing the paying, they know to the nickel).
Get the public coming and going... and turn the teachers into serfs... while providing an education for the children so that they can go to college and be the next generation of teacher-serfs....

[Starry Messenger]

18. Nicely summed up! nt

[LooseWilly]

38. The whole plan reminds me of housing built in the parking lot of a shopping mall...

just not quite as tacky... and slightly more prison barracks for a teacher work-gang.... vibey. I can't help but suspect that, after buying the company housing with the company pay, and shopping at the company grocery store (we know there's gonna be a mall in every housing development)... I suspect the teachers aren't going to walk out, after doing a 2 -5 year stretch, with much more in their pockets that a con who spent the same time making license plates... or whatever the hell they have convicts working on these days.

I'm sure I'm just misunderstanding though... "Nothing is more important that teachers," Obama said on... Thursday was it?... I'm sure we'll see that reflected in their pay, relative to Wall St. ... any day now.

[RainDog]

4. privatization has given us such great health care!!

why wouldn't we want our children and teachers to be beholden to profit-driven assholes?

[Starry Messenger]

6. They have our best interests at heart.

How could this possibly go wrong? :sarcasm:

[Liberal_in_LA]

5. wow. let's see how these 'villages' work out

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

7. A factory village! Will it have a company store too?

Talk about everything old being new again!

It will be great to be a teacher teaching at a charter school for your charter wages and living in your charter housing.

Things are getting creepier and creepier.

[Starry Messenger]

8. Yes, it's being built around a new retail corridor.

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/05/newark_developers_teachers_vil.html

NEWARK -- Ron Beit, whose name now finds itself in the top tier of Newark’s roster of developers, has won the city’s final nod to create a "Teachers Village" that is to become home to three charter schools with 1,000 students and 221 residential units marketed to educators.

The $120 million project -- intended to lure the 15,000 people who staff the rich base of schools and universities but don’t necessarily live in New Jersey’s largest city -- hit the fast track last week when Newark’s Central Planning Board gave final site-plan approval.

"We’re dotting our i’s and crossing our t’s at this point. We’re on a very steep trajectory to getting this thing done," Beit, a 37-year-old Englewood Cliffs native and attorney who heads up the New York-based RBH Group, said today.

Sometime this autumn, Beit intends to break ground along William and Halsey streets for "Teachers Village at Four Corners," which will include seven new buildings, the rehabilitation of a nine-story shell and the demolition of eight largely vacant buildings dating from the 1870s in the Four Corners Historic District.

No less significant is the creation of a retail corridor in ground-floor shops and a marriage of two of the city’s more vibrant draws: University Heights -- home to Rutgers University and the New Jersey Institute of Technology, among others -- and the Prudential Center, the 18,000-seat arena known as "The Rock."

I'd love to know who owns what. This is going to be very profitable for someone. How much freedom will a teacher feel they can have if her/his school's owner also owns her/his home?

[WinkyDink]

39. I'm betting down deep are the names "Bush" and "Cheney."

[TBF]

40. Unfortunately the names Duncan and Obama always come up too...

this dismantling of public education is going to kill this country. And again, as I always say about war, I want to know exactly which presidents and congress critters are going to be first in line to enroll their own children in these schools.

Didn't think so.

[johnaries]

9. What a lying hit piece!

First of all, the charter schools are not "privatized". From NJ's charter school website http://www.njcharterschools.org/Default.aspx?tabid=32

Q. What are Charter Schools?
A. Charter schools are public schools that operate independently from district schools. In New Jersey, they may be organized by a group of teachers, parents, community groups or institutions of higher education. These groups enter into an agreement with the state board of education and receive a performance contract called a “charter”. Charter schools are public schools and may not charge tuition. With the advent of charter schools, parents now have a choice in public education.

Charter schools are public schools and may not charge tuition. They are funded by public dollars and must educate children free of charge.

Failing charter schools are closed down.

And from the NY Times article this bullshit article links to:

Mr. Meier has gone to greater lengths than in the past to merge his design with its context, not just by breaking it down into several buildings, but also by using strategies like a pedestrian passageway cut between two of the charter schools. In an effort to diminish the monumentality of a building that houses two schools, part of it will be clad in white metal panels, part in brick. And the few existing buildings worth preserving, including an old red-brick factory and a two-story stucco building that houses Je’s Restaurant, a local landmark, will be restored.

The design incorporates some of the sensibilities that can be found in Mr. Meier’s higher-end projects. The apartment buildings include small, open courtyards and outdoor terraces, bringing light deep into their interiors. In each building a ground-floor retail level is conceived as a glass band, imbuing the floors above with an air of weightlessness. This effect is reinforced by the irregular pattern of the apartment windows, which gives the facades a cubist feeling.

Mr. Meier has already completed a preliminary design for a second phase of development, with 15 additional apartment buildings that Mr. Beit said could go into construction as early as 2011. It would extend the project several blocks to the north and west, giving it the kind of critical mass that could begin to turn the area around.

Hardly sounds like a "medievel castle" full of "stables". It is intended to help rejuvenate and revitalize a decaying area.

[Earth_First]

11. quick! put this on! n/t

[w4rma]

12. Regardless of who funds them (the money will always come from local citizens) who OWNS the schools?

Who?

[Starry Messenger]

15. I believe they are TEAM charter schools.

http://teamschools.org/about/team-board/

Here's an article I found that leads me to that conclusion about TEAM being the network involved in the redevelopment:

http://www.schoolconstructionnews.com/articles/2010/02/2/central-force-educational-facilities-and-mixed-use-developments

Cities also benefit when schools move into neighborhoods. The daily traffic of students, parents, teachers and staff becomes an integral component of the urban fabric and helps the city reach critical mass. The influx of pedestrians brings new investment and businesses to the area, which further generates pedestrian activity.

Urban centers provide students access to a wealth of cultural resources, performance spaces, community centers and parks. Learning literally goes beyond classroom walls.
When TEAM Charter Schools opened a new high school last August in downtown Newark, N.J., students found themselves directly across the street from City Hall and near several city parks, the New Jersey Performing Arts Center and Rutgers University’s Newark campus.

Grouping educational institutions together provides opportunities for sharing cultural, athletic and performance resources. New Jersey City University in Jersey City, N.J., benefits from its proximity to University Academy Charter High School, which provides classrooms with ample space at night for its nontraditional students.

They are in the KIPP network. You can see Newark Mayor Booker is quoted on the site. He is involved with Democrats For Education Reform with hedge fund manger Whitney Tilson, who is the vice-chairman of KIPP. Tilson absolutely hates public schools and teachers unions.


Also from that article:

The type of schools students attend is also changing. Almost 1.2 million students (2.3 percent) attended charter schools in the 2006-07 school year. Charter schools can flex their muscles on land and real estate acquisition because they are privately owned and developed.

Even the charter advocates in this article tell the truth about their land holdings and private nature.

Thank you for asking such a great question. Too bad "ignored" couldn't be so thoughtful. But anyone who quotes "facts" from a charter school advertisement website couldn't be too fun to talk to anyway!

[w4rma]

17. Thank you, Starry Messenger! (nt)

[madfloridian]

19. Why are you quoting from a charter school advocacy site?

Something more objective would be better.

[Starry Messenger]

20. Seriously.

It's like quoting Philip Morris for facts about smoking. Although, I'm not sure wikipedia and answer.com were really a step up either. :D

[Catshrink]

24. Come on MF, you know he's an expert.

An expert on everything. This week it's education....

Remember a couple of weeks ago he started a thread saying all teachers suck? In his current bullshit thread he said teachers should be paid more. Talk about confusing.

I think the word dilettante applies.

[Raineyb]

35. Right because a website touting how great charter schools are is going to be oh so

neutral about what they are. It's not like they have an agenda. Oh wait! Oops!

[laughingliberal]

36. Horrible. K & R for exposure. nm

[Starry Messenger]

37. Thank you!

This story really got under my skin. I don't think I did a good job of explaining it, I thought it would be kind of self-explanatory why this was a red flag.

[Subdivisions]

10. K n/t

[Starry Messenger]

13. Mayor Cory Booker is a member of Democrats For Education Reform.

Never has a think-tank been so sadly misnamed. They are an astroturf group that channels millions of dollars to influence elections and to elect candidates that promote charter schools and take down unions. I have a long thread about them in my journal. http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Starry%20Messenger/123

As for NJ charter schools being public, well they do get public funds. They are also "supplemented" with large amounts of cash from groups long-known to have anti-public education agendas.

Economic disadvantages may explain why fewer charters are being founded in the state. Last year, the Department of Education only granted a charter to one school. But if money is part of the problem, it can also, of course, be part of the solution.

In April, seven foundations—including the Walton Family Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation—pledged a total of $19 million to help strengthen Newark’s charter schools. Newark mayor Cory Booker, long a booster of charter schools, continues to believe they are an essential element in the city’s educational landscape. “They bring innovation and new educational options that our city desperately needs to ensure that every child receives an excellent education,” Booker tells New Jersey Monthly. Charters, he is convinced, “will play a critical role in raising the bar for all our learning institutions.”

http://njmonthly.com/articles/towns_and_schools/charter-schools-boon-or-bust.html


That article is full of charter school puffery, but is rather frank at the end about where the money comes from to "compete" with public schools.

[LWolf]

14. I'm speechless.

Really.

:wow:

[proud2BlibKansan]

32. Me too

[Bozita]

16. Education news in "Murika" is sounding more and more like it's taken from "The Onion"

[asdjrocky]

21. Wow, it's good when an actual teacher checks in.

K&R!

[Starry Messenger]

22. Occasionally we rabble raise our voices around our betters.

:D

[LWolf]

23. Can't raise it loud enough, or often enough, for me.

[Starry Messenger]

34. +100,000

[asdjrocky]

29. Where would we be without the Great Unwashed?

Shouldn't you be eating cake? :hi:

[Catshrink]

25. Oh goody! FEMA camps for teachers!

[tinymontgomery]

26. sounds like the old

factory housing type of environment that went on a long time ago. How does that saying go " those that don't study history are bound to repeat it"?

[Starry Messenger]

27. That's what I think too.

I saw some pictures of the plans and they look like the hastily thrown up condos that the Bay Area (CA) is littered with right now. The look is very "modern", but they hide a host of shabby construction faults. Just the fact that they are being built around the "anchor" of charter schools is enough to raise my alarm though.

[KamaAina]

28. Schools in rural Hawai'i used to have teacher housing

places like Moloka'i. Even that went away decades ago.

But I suppose you can't expect all those fresh-faced, well-scrubbed teachers to, you know, live in Newark, what with all those scary black people around. :sarcasm:

[nadinbrzezinski]

30. How long until these fine folks

are paid in company script?

JEEEZZZUUUU AGE... we will be fighting that battle AGAIN within a generation!

But we have folks round these parts applauding this.

[Starry Messenger]

33. Heck, maybe not even paid anymore.

They can just install teacher chow reward centers. OK, I kid, but really this little colony is just a bad idea. What happens when a teacher gets fired? Do they come home to find their door locks changed?

[LostinVA]

31. k&r